It's Murder, My Son (A Mac Faraday Mystery) (14 page)

“Did Pay Back show up while you were there?”

“Ten days later,” David told him. “Katrina had invited me to dinner. We had a bottle of wine and both of us passed out in the living room.”

“Wait a minute,” Mac interrupted him. “You passed out after only one bottle of wine?”

“The wine had to have been drugged. Afterwards, we both felt like death warmed over for several days.” David said, “It had to have been Pay Back because while we were unconscious, he came in and wrote ‘Pay Back is hell’ and ‘This time you live! Next time you’ll die!’ on all her mirrors with her lipstick. He also slashed her bed. He could have killed us both, but he didn’t. This time the security company said there was no break in the system. No one entered the code to deactivate it, nor did they set it off. As far as the security company is concerned, no one came in at all.” He sighed. “It was the Ford case all over again.”

“What’s the Ford case?” Mac wanted to know.

“Milo Ford,” David said. “During his career, Dad had a couple of cases where he didn’t catch the killer. The Ford case was one that he couldn’t figure out how the killer did it. It’s exactly the same as Katrina’s case. Milo Ford had built Katrina’s house back in the mid-1980s. He was a pompous ass. He owned one of the biggest real estate agencies in Deep Creek. Dad found out that Milo was the local drug connection to the rich and famous. No one would testify to bring down the local power brokers’ candy man and Dad had no evidence to prove anything. When Dad managed to get warrants to search Milo’s house he would never find anything. Not one thing. Dad could never bust him.”

Mac reminded him, “You said this was a murder case.”

“One Sunday night, Milo’s wife and kids came home from a weekend away and found him shot to death in the family room. The security system was on and there was no sign of any forced entry. Nothing. Even Robin Spencer couldn’t figure it out.”

“A locked door murder,” Mac smiled. “I’ve never had a case like that.”

“That’s what Katrina’s murder is,” David said. “The security system was on when I found her body. I had the code and turned it off when I went in. The security company had no record of any break in the system since the evening of the murder when she had let Gnarly out.”

“How did your affair with Katrina end?”

David said, “It wasn’t any torrid love affair. Not the type Phillips will present to Fleming. I knew Katrina wanted money and status. After everything that had happened, she couldn’t wait to get out of Deep Creek, and I made no pretense of going with her. She planned to leave Deep Creek Lake for good the Monday after Valentine’s Day and put the house on the market.”

“Were you at her place that night?”

“No. Chad was supposed to be coming back. Besides, once she got Gnarly she didn’t need me to protect her.”

Mac sat back and propped a foot up on the empty chair next to him at the table. He watched the boats out on the water. Fishermen were making their way onto the lake after the jet skis and speed boats had turned in.

He asked David, “Where was Gnarly that night Pay Back knocked you and Katrina out?”

“Katrina didn’t get Gnarly until the month after that. Chad had a client who was a dog trainer and he had this retired police dog. Chad bought him and shipped him out here.”

“Retired police dog?” Mac was puzzled. “Gnarly can’t be more than two years old.”

Preoccupied with his problems, David nodded his head. “Yeah, Gnarly does have a lot of puppy in him.”

“Do you believe the Hardwicks about their security camera being broken the night Katrina was killed?”

“No, but we don’t have any evidence to prove otherwise.”

“Even if the killer was able to get around the security system,” Mac mused, “how did he get around Gnarly?”

“The only thing I can come up with is that Gnarly was outside. There’s no break in the system for her to let him in,” David replied. “That’s where I found him.”

“If she was killed after letting Gnarly out, then how did the killer get inside without Gnarly catching him?” Mac wondered.

“You got me.”

“Were any dog bites reported at the time of the murder?”

David cocked his head at him. “I’m not an amateur. I checked with the hospital and all the clinics and doctors’ offices in the area. There were none.”

*   *   *   *

Two hours later, customers packed the Spencer Inn.

“David, I think we should go home.”

David’s reaction confirmed Mac’s suspicion that he was unable to drive. “Yeah, you’re right. Mickey Forsythe is always right, just like Dad was. He always does the right thing, always gets his man, and never makes a mistake.”

Mac wondered if the bitterness in David’s tone was rooted in Mac’s connection to Patrick O’Callaghan.  “I know how it feels to have your whole life turned upside down.” Mac told him, “A year ago, I came home and found my wife of over twenty years in bed with the assistant district attorney. Did you know that?”

David shook his head.

“Did you know that even though she was the one cheating, because her lover had so many influential friends, I was the one taken to the cleaners? I lost everything. I had an appointment scheduled for the next day to meet with a bankruptcy lawyer when Ed hunted me down,” Mac recalled. “I thought Ed was one of my ex-wife’s friends. I wouldn’t return his phone calls. He’d come in one door at the police station and I’d go out the other. I had no idea I was running from a man wanting to give me a check for two hundred and seventy million dollars.”

David laughed loudly. The customers at the next table turned their heads to look at them.

“Goes to prove that none of us is perfect.”

“Not perfect?” David asked in a sarcastic tone. “You live on the Point, damn it! You own this town and you don’t even know it.”

“There’s a difference between being rich and powerful, and being perfect. If rich meant perfect, Katrina wouldn’t be dead.”

“You’re Mickey Forsythe.”

“Mickey was a figment of Robin Spencer’s imagination.”

“Hell! You even drive his car!”

“I read the description of his car in her first book and thought it was cool,” Mac said. “I decided to buy one. It was the first piece of luxury I ever indulged in.”

“You were the top homicide detective in Georgetown,” David reminded him.

“I may have been, but my boss treated me as badly as yours does. He’d take credit for my work. He’d blame me for his mistakes. The brass upstairs didn’t like me because they wanted cases closed fast, even if it meant putting innocent people in jail. I asked too many questions. That’s why I never made chief.”

David leaned across the table and whispered, “Mickey is always accused of asking too many questions. After inheriting his mother’s millions, he quit his job because his bosses hated him for not playing the game.”

“What game?”

“The kiss your boss’s ass game.” David sat back. “Mickey doesn’t care who the bad guy is or who his friends are. If you’re a bad guy, you’re going down.” He finished off the bottle in one gulp and slammed it down. “You’re Mickey Forsythe.”

Mac ended the conversation with a suggestion that sounded more like an order. “Let’s go home.”

David accepted his hand on his elbow to lift him to his feet in order to guide him around the deck to the parking lot.

“Hey, buddy, how ya doing?”

In the parking lot, Mac made out Travis’s muscular shape in silhouette under the bright lamp. He was stepping out of his red Mercedes convertible. His black sports jacket matched his slacks. 

In a low, threatening tone, David asked, “Did you tell Phillips that I was spending nights at Katrina’s place?”

Travis looked from David to Mac.

“You were here when Katrina told us about how scared she was sleeping alone since her husband had left,” David reminded him. “I was trying to catch the guy.”

“Was he the only thing you were trying to catch?” the novelist asked with a smile. “Hey, I’m not the one who slipped between the sheets with a married murder victim.” 

“So you did rat me out!”

Travis stepped back with a shake of his head. “Phillips asked and I answered. That’s all.”

Mac grabbed David by the waist and forced him over the hood of his Viper when he lunged for the author.

“You’ve got a problem, O’Callaghan,” Travis said. “You don’t know how to use your head. I would have handled the whole thing differently. Too bad. I had hoped we could still be friends.”

Mac said, “I don’t think you two ever were friends.”

Chuckling, Travis climbed the steps to the Inn.

“Get in the car,” Mac ordered.

“He ratted me out,” David muttered while climbing into the passenger seat of the Viper.

Mac started the engine. “Do you know what this means?”

David shook his head. “I’ve had too much to drink to know what anything means right now.”

“Travis and Sophia knew you were over at Katrina’s place while her husband was out of town.”

“And he told Phillips.”

“You had kept it a secret that you were over there because you wanted to catch Pay Back when he made his move. But Travis blew your cover—pardon the expression. Pay Back probably knew, too.” 

*   *   *   *

 “What’s wrong with him?” Violet demanded to know when Mac called to report that David was spending the night at his house.

“He’s sick to his stomach.”

He turned away to escape Archie’s green eyes peering at him from where she sat in front of the flames in the outdoor fireplace. The fire reflected off the golden tone of her bare arms and silky white lounging pajamas.

With his head hanging over the edge of the deck, Gnarly was stretched out on his back on the top step leading down to the beach. He also seemed to be watching his master.

Mac would have called Violet from inside the house, but it wasn’t like Archie wouldn’t notice David there the next morning. He’d learned early on that she didn’t miss a thing.

“But he has to work tomorrow,” Violet objected.

“He’s not going to work tomorrow.”

“Why not?”

“Because he’s sick.” After soothing her with assurances that David would be home in the morning, Mac hung up and poured a glass of chardonnay from the bottle Archie had placed in the center of the table.

She took a sip of her wine before asking, “David’s in a lot of trouble, isn’t he?”

“Oh, yeah!” Mac sat back in his chair and propped his bare feet up on the table top between them. “Did you know that he was sleeping with Katrina?”

“No, but I’m not surprised,” she said. “David is very popular with the ladies. He’s easy on the eyes and really sweet. There’s nothing he wouldn’t do for you.”

“Especially if you’re a woman,” Mac quipped. “So I’ve found out.”

“Why did Travis blow the whistle? He was David’s friend.” Archie gazed at him through the darkness. His skin, which had turned bronze since his move to the lake, glowed in the light created by the flames.

“I don’t think Travis Turner is into friendship.”

“They all knew each other their whole lives,” she said. “Katrina, David, Travis. You’d think he’d want to help find Pay Back.”